


Fair Is Foul

by coffeeandcream



Category: CyberSix
Genre: Dark!Cybersix AU, Gen, she's just raised by von reichter so she's brainwashed, she's not really evil guys
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-05-21
Updated: 2017-03-23
Packaged: 2018-06-09 18:29:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 7,345
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6918292
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coffeeandcream/pseuds/coffeeandcream
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Cybersix's 4999 siblings are slaughtered, she does not escape. She stays with Von Reichter and is raised as his daughter, believing herself to be a monster whose purpose is to do his bidding.</p><p>But when she steps out into the human world and meets a man who changes her entire view of not only humanity, but herself, she begins to follow her siblings' steps in rebelling against everything she was ever taught and ever believed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Hateful Day When I Recieved Life!

As I look over this wretched city, my city, I can feel the thrum of life as it pulses through the air, through the lights of street lamps and apartment buildings, through the spraypainted pavement and the skyscraper rooftops. I feel the life as it reverberates in the honking horns and the bubbling voice of crowds.

I hear the wailing cry of an ambulance. Another hopeless life that someone is rushing to save. Pointless. A single life in the giant organism and ecosystem that is this throbbing, breathing city is so inconsequential that the idea of any form of effort to keep it in existence perplexes me. I listen to the circular, revolving sound, wondering at the desperate desire of humans to stay alive even though it is futile.

I remember my 4,999 brothers and sisters. All precious. All alive. Just as alive as any human, just as full of emotion and hope as any human. And yet when they were slaughtered and ground into piles of raw meat like animals, no ambulance raced down the street. No siren mourned their horrendous passing.

And I do not question why. I know why because I learned it that day. It is because those are human things. To want is human, to believe is human, to discover is human, to hope is human. To love is human. To deserve to live, and to deserve a fighting chance against the black hole that is death, is human.

My siblings were not human, nor am I. We were monsters, and we dealt in monstrous things. To need, and only that, is monstrous. To understand what we are told, and only that, is monstrous. To be content with what we have, and only that, is monstrous. To feel no emotion besides hate is monstrous. To be naturally deserving of death is monstrous. And it is only fitting that we succumb to and submerge ourselves in these things.

What right do I have to hope that if I fall, if I lie broken and bleeding in an alley on one of these cold, black-soaked nights, that maybe that ambulance will wail, closer and closer still, for me.

I turn from my crouch among the gargoyles to my fellow monsters, their large forms and misshapen heads making them less able than I to support the pretense of being human. It does not matter, however. I am just as much a monster as them.

And yet, despite this, I hope. I hope for life. And most absurd among all human things I dain to feel, I hope for love.

*

When I step into the kitchen, weary from another long night of flying, running, leaping from buildings, and feeling the impact of fists and feet against flesh, I smell burnt coffee and the faint remnants of what must now be a cold pan of brownies. I forlornly cast my gaze to the stovetop, where a baking dish sits, almost empty save for a few remaining squares of chocolatey dessert.

I take one and chomp down on it. Cold.

I take the coffee pot off of the still heated warming plate and take a sniff, recoiling quickly. I sigh as I pour almost three cups of coffee down the drain, long since used to José’s bad habit of leaving the expensive coffee machine on for hours at a time, and set about making a fresh pot.

It is then that a soft, powerful presence slinks around my legs, and I glance down to see vibrant yellow eyes glowing up at me in the dim light.

I smile, muted joy warming my heart for the first time all night. “Hello, Data 7. How have you been?”

The large panther rumbles out a somewhat disgruntled purr, too short to be fully content, as I pat his head and scratch under his chin. _Alright, I suppose_ , I translate, and I offer him a pitying smile. While I am in the outside world day and night, doing Father’s bidding, free to roam, he is locked inside like a caged animal, forced to live with that boy who is more of a beast than he is.

“José was hard to get along with today, wasn’t he?” I ask quietly as I kneel down to be at eye level with my last remaining sibling. The peace and comfort of the kitchen and the care behind the words we share give me a sense of reverence and softness that seems to beg for hushed words and soothing tones.

He rumbles again, more petulant this time, and bumps my chest with his head. I run my fingernails through the short, smooth fur of his neck and shoulders, laying one kiss, two kisses on the back of his head before resting my cheek against it, quietly holding him.

I know he hates it, being cooped up, being forced to deal with that wretched little creature, never being listened to or understood, never being more than a tool that’s never taken out of its case.

“The day is over, my dear brother. You don’t have to grit your teeth anymore,” I murmur, knowing that my voice is barely audible but that his keen ears will gather my words anyway.

He pulls back then, only to bump my chin with his nose. _Neither do you_.

I smile at him, fondness overwhelming my chest. “You’re right. It’s my time to relax as well. Come on,” I say, standing and grabbing the coffee pot off of the warming plate, “Sit with me while I have my coffee.”

Data 7’s tail curls around his feet, pleased. So we sit and talk about nothing and everything for hours upon hours until the coffee pot has been drained of its last drop and the clock’s first number has switched back to single digits.

We head to my room. Data 7 hates where they have him sleep. It’s practically a cage, meant for an animal. The foot of my bed or the floor by the side of it are his preferred resting places.

We pass by José in the hallway, but he is apparently too preoccupied with whatever task our father has placed in his hands to stop and speak with us. All he does is send us a small glare and click his tongue in distaste.

“You two disgust me,” I remember him saying once, with a sneer as we sat on the window seat and dozed in the sunlight that filtered through perfectly scrubbed glass, “Stop cuddling and do something productive, I can’t stand to see your strange display of attachment. It’s not normal for Cyber or Data to be attached, you know.”

Data 7 huffs out a breath through his large panther nose. _Good. I hate it when he speaks_.

I chuckle. My brother is the only one who can pull a laugh from me.

As I feel myself drift off to sleep, the weight of Data 7 on my feet, I know that the next day will be just like the last one. Difficult, full of pain and effort and hardship, and I know that Data 7 will have to endure another day of patiently bearing his own hatred, but these moments, these nights, are what make living worthwhile. Not deserved, per se, but good enough that I prevent myself from taking a step toward a true monster’s destiny and joining my other brothers and sisters in that deep, dark, peaceful black hole.

*

“José,” I call, putting the phone down on the chestnut end table and walking into the living room. His head of dark hair is poking out from behind the arm of the plush, white sofa, and I don’t need to see the headphone band over his head or the comically large ear pads over his comically large ears to know that he’s listening to that vitriol he calls music. I can hear its harsh beats and poorly harmonized chorus from across the room. I wonder briefly why he isn’t deaf yet. Perhaps Father programmed that out of him.

I look to the ceiling, wanting to rip the stupid headphones off of his head, and yell his name louder. He gives no response.

“José,” I shout again, louder still. “JOSÉ!”

Then, as I feel rage fill my throat, he very pointedly lifts his ipod and turns up the volume, continuing to nod his head to the music.

That is it. I storm forward and snatch the infernal things off of his head, and he whips around, eyes wild with fury.

“How dare you? Give those back this instant!” he demands in his perpetually prepubescent voice, and I turn my lips down into a scowl at him.

“You should listen to your big sister, little monster, when she’s talking to you. Maybe then you won’t get your headphones-” I cut off when he jumps off the sofa and makes a grab for the headphones, stepping away to keep them out of the reach of his greedy little hands.

“You have no right,” he hisses at me, “no right to touch my things! That is mine and you will give it back to me this instant, or I will call Father and tell him that you are a thieving, brutish bitch who should have been put through that-”

I grab his face in one hand, clasping his cheeks and stopping his speech before he can say anything that will force me to do far worse than steal his headphones. “Speaking of Father, he’s on the phone. He wishes to speak with you…” I watch with glee as his eyes go wide with realization and horror, “...immediately.”

I release his face and he wipes both cheeks with an arm as he runs into the adjoining room to grab the telephone, spewing curses at me.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was a birthday present to my sister that I'm going to continue adding to. Hope y'all like it. Comments are super welcome.


	2. I Have Love in Me the Likes of Which You Can Scarecly Imagine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Cybersix meets humankind, also a really hot guy.

“Do not be fooled,” my father says as we speak of my entrance into the human world, “The scum that walk this earth are far beneath the likes of you or any other creation I blessed with existence. They will act like they’re equal to you, but it is not true. You are better than them.”

I walk into my first day of being a human school teacher with apprehension. I worry for silly reasons. Acceptance, likability, social standing, these are all things I have no reason to fret over, and yet my heart beats rapidly and my stomach feels as though it is trying to digest itself from the inside out. My hands shake and my palms sweat.

The interview was easy enough. My forged credentials were enough to get the most unappealing creature a job at this establishment, and the added bonus of my alias, Adrian Seidelman, being a white man only made the choice that much easier. The first day of my new job, however, seems ridiculously daunting. I am not prepared for all the throes that come with teaching a group of human children the intricacies of literature, nor am I prepared for maintaining a false air of normalcy and humanity when I have never understood or experienced either of the two in my life. But I must steal my heart and push myself through the day. Father barely accepted my chosen profession due to its lack of influence and low pay. If I cannot make it work, then I am doomed to doing whatever Father chooses, and that something will inevitably be something that makes me loathe to rise from bed in the morning.

As the first group of children files into the classroom and take their seats, I look to the book sitting on the desk beside me. _Macbeth,_ by Shakespeare. A classic, full of murder and secrecy, tainted morality and good intentions gone too far. I’ve always felt a connection with the story, each new page I drank up giving me more a sense of belonging than the very world I live in ever did, the reason for which never being entirely clear to me.

I look to the students sitting before me, their blank stares windows that reveal blank minds, and suddenly I lose my fear. I forget my true purpose, I forget that I am here as an agent of my father, to infiltrate the human world, to support his plan. As I look at the students, my students, I am filled with a conviction. This is a book I can delve deep into and draw insight from. This was a book I can teach. And these are students I can reach.

I lift the book from its place on my desk and open to the first page.

“Hello, students. I am Mr. Seidelman, your new English teacher. This year, we are all going to read Shakespeare’s _Macbeth_. It is a play about a man who is very ambitious, and, because of his desires, he brings unimaginable pain to others. You can all come up and take a copy from the pile on my desk, and we’ll begin reading.”

*

It is on my second day of working at the human school that I encounter a problem. I decided that my alias would be male simply for the sake of ensuring I would never be recognized when performing my nighttime duties. However, I never anticipated that being a male teacher could bring such difficulties in regards to female students during their transformative years of becoming women. One such student, Lori, is particularly insistent on forming a relationship with me, despite my repeated protest and rejections and the fact that it is completely illegal under the current laws regarding consent.

Today in class, she gave me yet another inappropriate love note, which I, in my utter exasperation with her, threw away.

In hindsight, that was not a wise decisions, considering the snarling, spitting group of boys standing before me now. They managed to corner me on my way home from a day of work, backing me against an alley wall.

“You’re gonna pay for what you did to Lori, Seidelman,” one of the boys snaps, making my name sound like a bad word.

I, a monster with superior strength and intellect whose experience and capabilities far surpass theirs, am suitably unimpressed. I set my body in a ready stance, prepared to take on the gangly group who are naive enough to think they are anything more than mere children.

One boy’s face seems to shift entirely to the side of his head as a hand strikes him from the side in an admirably solid punch. The rest of the boy’s body follows, and he flies to my left and sprawls on the ground. I turn to look at my defender, and immediately recognize him as one of the teachers I’ve seen lurking around the coffee machine in the teachers’ lounge.

He is a large man, muscular, with hair hanging from his head in unkempt yet not unappealing strands of gold, and his eyes are narrowed in anger at the small group of boys.

My initial reaction is surprise, quickly followed by indignation. I am not weak, despite my small stature in comparison to his admittedly substantial build. Who was he to presume that I needed his unprompted intervention?

The boys, surely and unfairly startled by his showy bravado and daunting physique, scatter as quickly as they can from the alleyway. I turn to the man.

“You shouldn’t have let them go,” I say, frowning, “They’ll never learn their lesson that way.”

A startled laugh escapes the man, and his eyes turn to me, wide and without a single shred of anger left. “I can’t just beat them all up, Seidelman, they’re just kids. I’d get fired!”

I consider this strange statement. They instigated the fight. It does not seem plausible to lose one’s job for self defense. 

“They started it,” I answer, “Why should either of us get in trouble for finishing it?” 

This time, his laugh is a hearty one, full of what I consider undue merth. “You said it, pal! But that’s just the way it is, eh? Lil’ brats get away with anything in this damn system.” 

I turn to where the children fled the scene, and I contemplate this new information. The realization enters my mind like a creeping doom. I have no idea how one is supposed to behave when one is a school teacher. I have no idea what I am doing in this position, so much so that the very notion of what I just suggested to this man caused him to laugh at me.

I need to find out more, need to glean some information on how I must act before I do something too noticeable and lose my position that I so strongly wish to maintain.

“Hey, you wanna go get something to eat? I know this great-”

“Yes,” I say, cutting the man off mid-sentence. I decide I must glean as much information from him as I possibly can, considering he is a teacher such as myself who knows the ins and outs of performing properly in the role.

“Alright, then let’s go,” he says, “I’m Lucas, by the way, Lucas Amato.”

The restaurant he leads me to is indeed great. It has some of the best coffee I’ve ever had, even better than the concoction the ridiculously expensive machine we have at home produces. Lucas Amato, despite the opportunity to indulge in the fantastic drink, chooses instead to order a pasta dish.

I open my mouth, wondering how I am going to make interrogating him about how to be a teacher seem normal, when he begins talking.

“So, Adrian. Mind if I call you Adrian?”

I do. It seems unprofessional. “No.”

“Great. I want to show you something.” He pulls out a folder and flips it open. “Take a look at these.”

The folder is filled with nothing but photographs and I pick one up. My heart freezes. The photograph is of me. Not of me as Adrian Seidelman, but of me as Cybersix, as my true self. As the monster, and not the human.

I first steady my hand. I must keep it from trembling lest he become concerned. Then I make sure I can speak without my voice betraying how shaken I am.

“What is this?” I ask, as if I don’t know already.

Amato smiles, and the smile is so knowing, so confident that I feel my whole body tense, the fear filling my chest that I will have to kill him to keep what he has discovered silent.

“I have no idea,” he answers.

I stare at him with incredulous exasperation.

“But I sure would like to find out,” he says, sitting back in his seat with a wistful sigh from which I can feel the intense longing. “She’s amazing, Adrian. Just look at her. I’ve been photographing her for a while now, and the things I’ve seen…” He shakes his head in disbelief. “She wanders the buildings of our city, performing inhuman feats. Unless parkour suddenly got a lot more advanced than when I last checked. She’s almost inhuman. No, no she _is_ inhuman!”

I stare at the photograph I am holding as he talks. He is correct. I am not human. It only makes sense that I would be fascinating to him, like a freak in the circus.

“She’s beautiful!” he exclaims, startling me.

“Beautiful?” I ask, not able to comprehend what he just said.

“Of course! She’s like the pinnacle of human evolution, a genetic miracle! The things she can do, Adrian! She’s… she’s the most beautiful person I’ve ever seen!” He turns his eyes to me, filled to the very brim with excitement and passion.

Never have I heard anyone speak of me this way. With such admiration. With such adoration. With such, dare I say it, love.

“And, I mean, she’s really attractive too,” he adds in the gap of my stunned silence.

I shake my head. What am I thinking? I cannot allow the fantastical obsessions of a human to cloud my thinking. So what if he thinks these things about me? He is obviously mentally deranged, and I cannot allow him to pursue this disturbing hobby of photographing me while I do my father’s work.

“Okay, this is insane. There’s no way this girl is what you say she is. A genetic miracle? It’s impossible,” I insist, feeling wrong as the enthusiasm drains from his expression, only to be frustrated as the look is replaced by steady defiance.

“I thought you literary types were supposed to have good imaginations,” he intones, and the taunt makes my hackles raise.

“You cannot suggest that my love of literature requires me to believe the unbelievable and fantastical,” I retort.

“Oh no? You guys read about aliens and witches all day long, but you won’t even entertain the idea of a woman who jumps skyscrapers? I thought this was right up your alley. Kind of hypocritical if you ask me.”

I find myself flabbergasted by his complete lack of understanding of the mind of a literature lover, and my grip on the photograph tightens enough to crinkle the thick, glossy paper.

“Mr. Amato, if this woman is indeed real and she can jump skyscrapers, then I will bet everything I own that she is not the creation of a writer’s imagination, but the creation of a scientist’s imagination that has gone too far.”

As I try to keep my breath steady and my temper in check, his mouth stretches into a grin, and the obstinate look leaves his eyes to be replaced with delighted surprise as a low chuckle shakes his broad shoulders. My eyebrows knit in confusion.

“I like you, Adrian. You’re pretty alright,” he says, leaning back into his chair.

I realize with a start that I completely forgot my original objective of convincing him that Cybersix did not exist in the face of being insulted as a literary scholar.

“And call me Lucas, by the way,” he mentions as he takes another bite of his pasta. “Now, tell me more about how scientists play God. Some call that scientific advancement.”

*

I come home late that evening to find Data 7 waiting for me in the kitchen. He looks tired from waiting up so long, and guilt flashes through me only briefly before I kneel down and begin telling him of the truly singular, truly exhilarating, truly electrifying, truly dreamlike dinner I had just had with Lucas Amato.

We do not stay up for our usual coffee, but instead head to my room for much needed rest. I, however, cannot seem to sleep. I remain awake to all hours of the night, running my fingers over Data 7’s fur and murmuring to him all the terribly wonderful things that make up this man named Lucas.

  
“And he said I was beautiful, Data 7,” I almost whisper, “he said I was beautiful.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one was long, but it was super fun to write. Next chapter we'll get a bit more Jose, and possibly something from someone else's point of view.
> 
> Comments are always welcome. Hoped you liked it!


	3. Who Shall Conceive the Horrors of My Secret Toil

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Being Von Reichter's loyal creation means doing monstrous things.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know I said Jose was gonna be in the next one, but I had to get this out there.
> 
> This one is pretty violent, so content warning.

The chilled gusts of the night beat against my furrowed brow as I crouch atop one of the city’s apartment complexes, my body just another black, unnoticed silhouette among the tips of the surrounding skyscrapers. I peer at the lush private home across the street, my superior eyes able to peer through the ink of the night unaided, and I see my victim.

He is an older man, plump and clearly the beneficiary of the finer things in life. He is also the most likely candidate for senator this coming election. Most importantly, he is a thorn in my father’s side.

Eyes locked onto the sleeping and unsuspecting form of the would-be senator, I leap from the edge of the rooftop and soak in the sensation of the brief flight between buildings, air whipping through my cloak and hair, battering against my eyes enough to make them water. The cold rush pushes adrenaline through my veins, and the pumping of my heart only urges me forward, focusing my mind entirely on what I must do.

I land on the roof of the near tower of a home with the sharp clack and crunch of my heels, one hand out to steady myself upon the impact, before slinking down the side to the small ledge that circles the building like a treacherous snake. I don’t bother with subtlety, shattering the entire window in one swift strike of my fist.

My breath is slow and evenly paced, long drags in and long blows out, as I duck into the unlit room. Already the man is awake and sitting bolt upright in his large and overly-soft bed, and I can see the whites of his eyes as he gawks at me in paralyzing fear.

I am suddenly reminded of Lucas, his expression as he spoke about me, and the way he regarded me in his photos. Not an ounce of fear in his voice, only admiration, only wonder. If only the poor fool could see me as I am now. I wonder if he would look at me the same way the man before me is looking at me now. Would he be stricken with fear as well? Would he be horrified? Would he shake his head at my apparent betrayal?

I feel foolish at the hurt this mere thought causes me, and I push it away as the man scrambles out from under his covers and onto the floor, putting his bed between us.

“Wha-what do you want from me?” he cries out in a shrill voice, his entire body trembling, “Who sent you? What do you want?!”

I say nothing, stepping around the bed as I move closer to my prey, taking in the panicked breaths and pale skin that remind me of who I am, of my place in the world.

Yes, I am but a monster. Look upon me as so. You are a human, far above me. You are a righteous race, your morality a characteristic of your very being. You are God’s creation, and your place in this world was carved out for you before you were even conceived. You have a right to existence. I do not.

Look upon me, just human, as the monster I am. I am stronger than you, faster than you, more durable, more intelligent, I am capable of so much more than you could ever be. If not for your morality, I would be superior to you in every way. My mere existence is a crime, my presence a taint upon the world. I am a monster, and I deal in monstrous things.

And monsters kill.

He backs away from me, seeing the hunter’s intent in my eyes, turning to run. I move, lightning quick, so fast that no human could hope to avoid me, and I have him pinned against the wall in one firm hand, his weight nothing compared to how much I am capable of bearing. With my other hand I reach to the holster strapped onto my hip and pull out the sleek, silver weapon. The gun’s presence feels heavier in my hand than the man does. I point it at his head.

The man claws at my wrist, choking for air, his eyes running wild. There is a glistening trail of drool running down his chin. And yet, despite this, he manages to plead for his life in one last desperate attempt to survive.

“Pl… please,” he gasps out, “d… on’t.”

“Poor human,” I murmur, my finger applying the barest pressure to the handgun’s trigger, “Your race is going to die out anyway. My father is a god, and he is going to exterminate you from the world. Why struggle? Why try? You have no hope.”

His eyes meet mine, and even his state of near unconsciousness cannot mask the waves of fear and pain that roll from him and batter themselves against my conscience.

“I’m doing you a favor,” I say, and I pull the trigger.

Blood and brain matter splatter the wall behind his head, and my face is wet from the spray. I let his body fall onto the floor, and I watch as a red chunk of his skull separates from his head and lands on the floor beside him with a meaty thunk. The wet sound of blood dripping off the wallpaper and oozing from his head is the only sound in the suddenly echoing bedroom.

The gun goes back in its holster and I wipe a bit of the still hot liquid off of my face with my fingers. I turn to exit the way I came when I notice a photograph sitting on the nightstand by the disheveled bed, the dim glow of the moon shining on it just enough so that I can make out the image. It is of a woman, middle-aged but still beautiful, the wrinkles on her face giving her a sense of wisdom. There are two children with her, one a teenage girl and another a younger boy. And sitting beside the woman, with a hand on the boy’s shoulder, is the man. His family. They must be away for some reason, on vacation or out on the town. It was pure luck they weren’t here at the time, or I would have had to kill them as well.

I stand in the darkness and stillness, staring at the photograph. I had not been informed that he had a family. That he was a husband, a father.

Does it matter? I am a monster, and I deal in monstrous things. To feel no emotion besides hate is monstrous. I shouldn’t care about him, or the family I tore him from.

I turn toward the window and throw myself back into the bitter night.

*

When I sit down the next day to another dinner with Lucas, something I am woefully pleased to admit has become an almost daily occurrence, I am met with a dark frown and troubled eyes.

“Is something the matter, Lucas?” I ask with a raised eyebrow, something uneasy curling in my gut as I think back to my activities the previous night.

Lucas is quiet for a bit before he reaches into his coat and pulls out the same folder that he presented to me upon our first meeting. He flips it open with a flick of his wrist and the first photograph I see is of me, crouched low and solemn, on the roof of the apartment building I was spying from last night.

I force my face to remain neutral. After finding out about his disconcerting hobby of photographing me while I do my nightly work, I had made it a point to watch for him, and sometimes I did spot him standing on the street or outside of buildings with his clunky old camera pointed toward the sky. And yet I failed to notice him last night of all nights.

I notice that my hands have formed trembling fists, and I unclench them before my companion can notice.

“I was following the woman again last night,” he says in a low tone, and it is so different from the bright, awe-filled way he spoke of me before. It sounds almost… disappointed. He flips to another photograph, and this one shows me climbing through the window of the man’s home. “She went in through this guy’s window. And, uh…”

I can’t bring myself to look at him, staring at the blurred picture of me. “And what?”

“I heard a gunshot. She went in, I heard a gunshot, and then she left. The only person in the building at the time was a man named Mr. Benjamin Marino. You may recognize the name, he was running for senate.” Lucas pauses. “He probably would have won.”

I take a sip of my coffee, forcing myself to swallow, forcing my next words to sound curious and clueless. “Would have?”

“He’s dead.”

I set down my mug.

“She killed him, Adrian. That woman, she’s… she’s a murderer, she killed him.”

Lucas runs his hand through his unruly hair, and I feel sick to my stomach when I can’t help but notice how attractive it is. I do not deserve to have such thoughts. I am a monster. And monsters deal in monstrous things. I feel agitation run through me as I realize that I have had to remind myself of those words more often as of late.

“She’s not what you thought she was, is she?” I ask him, my voice subdued to my own ears.

Lucas continues to frown, picking at his pasta. “No. She’s not.”

I nod, and I feel a weight settle in my gut as my fears come true. Lucas, with all his bright wonderment and excited fascination, Lucas, the only person who has ever seen me as something better than what I am, Lucas, who called me beautiful. Lucas, wonderful, trusting Lucas, seeing me for what I am. It’s enough to make me want to puke.

Perhaps it is for the best. I don’t know what I was expecting. Love? Ridiculous. It would never happen, it was never even a possibility. Acceptance? No monster could ever be accepted by a human. Understanding? How could a human ever understand an existence like mine. There was no point in hoping to begin with.

My own words echo back to me, the words I spoke to the man last night. “You have no hope.”

And I wonder. If humans should not deal in hope, and monsters should not deal in hope, then where does hope belong in this cruel world?

The rest of our dinner is spent speaking in hushed, serious tones. I go home to Data 7. I do not speak of my day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hoooope you liked that. Something a bit less heavy next time, I think.


	4. Nothing Is So Painful to the Human Mind as a Great and Sudden Change

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nothing affects your life like a painful and terrible childhood.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I lied, this is way heavier than last chapter. But. I hope you enjoy anyway!
> 
> Yay updating!

I’m afraid. So afraid. I don’t know where I am, where I’m going, what I’m doing. All I know is that I have to keep running. Keep running further and further until it can’t get me anymore, until it isn’t happening anymore. I need to keep lifting my legs, keep snapping twigs beneath my bare feet, keep ignoring the tears mingling with sweat on my neck, keep breathing, breathing, deep breaths, just take deep breaths, it’s all going to be okay.

But it’s not okay. Oh god, nothing is okay.

I used to think that this forest, the singing of the birds was beautiful. Now the cheerful melody is wrong. Mocking. I don’t think I should be able to hear the birds. How can I hear anything over their screams? Their screams… So loud. They were crying, screeching, struggling. I once heard the sound of pigs as they were being processed through a slaughterhouse. It sounded like that. Shrill, grinding, desperate. And over everything else, the whirring of the large, black machine that he was dropping them into. That he was pushing them through. That he… he… He.

How could he do this to us? I’ve never felt hate quite like this before. It burns inside me. I hate him. I hate him I hate him I…

I stop running. My feet are bleeding from running without shoes, my breaths are coming too fast. I bend over and bouts of chunky paste and mucous tear themselves out of my throat and plop onto the grass. I need to keep going. I need to get away from here.

I need to go back and help them. My brothers and sisters. I need to.

No. I can’t help them. I need to keep running. I need to live on. For them. I begin to run again, but the screams are so loud. How do I run with the screaming filling my head, with the tears, with the bones snapping and the blood gurgling, and the image of my sister disappearing into the machine and coming out as a pile of bloody flesh and hair? How do I run with that filling me up inside?

I can’t see straight. I can’t feel my legs. I can’t hear my own breathing. I can’t even hear the birds anymore. I have to get away. I have to get away from their screams.

*

“Do you know how you are still alive? Natural selection. The process that allows those meant to live, to live, and those meant to die, to die. You are still here because you were meant to live. Aren’t you lucky?”

He is standing over me. I can hear his breathing, I can smell the sanitizer on his hands. I can’t see anything human in the circle of pale light that reflects off of his glasses.

I am a Cyber. We are brash.

“You are not human,” I tell him.

He smiles. His lips pull the skin of his face upward into wrinkles. “You are correct, little one. I am not human.” He leans toward me. “I am God.”

“My brothers and sisters. They were human. And you killed them.”

He is fiddling with something now. The straps that are restraining me to the bed. He tightens them.

“The Cyber? Human? No, no, they were not human.” He sounds distracted, as though our conversation is merely an afterthought to what is happening within his mind. He turns to me, crisp movements, matter-of-fact. “They were monsters.”

I blink hard as he turns away to meddle with something at a nearby table. A syringe. He fills it with a bright yellow liquid.

“And so are you,” he says, turning back to me with syringe in hand. “A monster, that is.”

“I don’t feel like a monster.” I’m getting tired of the conversation, it’s not what I want to talk about. I want to talk about the screaming. The grinding. The blood and bones and hair and tears. I fix my eyes on him. “I hate you.”

His eyebrows raise in something like disdain. “You see? Hatred. A monster’s emotion.”

“I don’t care if we were monsters!” I’m screaming. I can hear my voice echoing around the room. I’m crying. I can feel the warmth of the drops as they fall onto my ears. “I don’t care! You killed them! You killed them all! How could you?! They didn’t deserve it! None of them deserved it!”

He reaches over to the table as I spew my words at him, grabs a large blob of cotton, and shoves it deep into my mouth. I gag on it.

“Of course they deserved it,” he says, “Monsters are naturally deserving of death.”

He inserts the syringe into my arm and the pain begins.

*

“Again, what are you?”

I scuff my foot against the leg of the chair I am seated in. My hands are folded in my lap, my back is straight, my head is held upward but my eyes are restrained to the floor. I am the picture of obedience. I am the way he prefers me. I take a breath to answer, I hesitate not a moment.

“I am a monster.” They’re just words. Just words. Saying them doesn’t make them true. That is what I tell myself. I used to refuse to say the words at all. Now I know that it’s preferable to the pain. I glance up at the syringe on his desk. The acidic yellow hisses at me from inside the clear glass.

“And what do monsters deal in?” He paces around me in a circle, slowly, oscillating in the constant threat of his presence.

“Monstrous things.”

“What things are monstrous?”

“To need, and only that. To understand what we are told, and only that. To be content with what we have, and only that. To feel no emotion besides hate.” I take in a deep breath and hold it.

He pauses in his rotation in front of me. He reaches out, his fingers snag my face in a vice-like grip. I flinch.

“You forgot one, my dear.”

I squeeze my eyes shut. I hate to say it. I hate to say it, I hate to so much. I hate him even more. But the pain… I open my eyes and look at him. “To be naturally deserving of death.”

He smiles. “Very good.”

The feeling of pleasure that fills me upon hearing his praise makes me want to throw up.

*

It is my thirteenth birthday. I sit in my room, alone, I stare at the blank wall as pale midday light filters through my bedroom window. I watch the shadows of the trees outside dance along the wall. My siblings are frozen in time, frozen as the age they were when they were murdered. And I am forced to age without them, play out the stages of life without them, grow and learn and become without them. It is not just.

But justice is a human construct.

I rub my hand against the silky comforter on my bed. Despite its name, the soft bed covering has done little to comfort me. Still, I continue to push my hand across it, back and forth, feeling the fibers of it tickle my skin.

A knock against the door startles me. It opens, and he is there. I stand at attention immediately. I must make sure to show him respect, or else he will be displeased.

“Happy birthday, Cybersix,” he says, low and smooth.

“Thank you,” I say, unsure of why he is here or what he wants from me.

“I have a present for you. Come.” He steps out of the doorway and back into the hall, beckoning me to follow him.

I am confused. What could he possibly want to give me? I hurry after him, watching the back of his head as he walks, apprehensive. He is silent the entire way, and I do not ask questions.

He takes me to his lab. I do not want to be here. The last time I was here, I was in pain. So, so much pain. I don’t like these walls, these lights, the air that is filling my lungs, I don’t like any of it. I want to leave. But he brought me here, so I must stay.

“I have been working on this for quite some time,” he muses, more for his own benefit than for mine, “And it is finally ready.”

He brings me to one of the many connecting chambers in his laboratory, pushing the door open with what must be a purposeful dramatic flair. I hold my breath.

A cage sits in the center of the room, metal and cold. Tables are scattered around it, various equipment lies about. Blood from the half eaten carcass of what looks like a deer drips from the floor of the cage to the floor of the laboratory. The only other thing in the cage is a large black form. Its fur shines in the harsh laboratory lights, its chest rises and falls steadily in sleep, a single heavy paw dangles from between two of the cage’s bars.

“Isn’t he magnificent?” he says, gripping my shoulder with one of his bony hands. “I call him Data 7. A proud success.”

“What did you do to him?” I ask, “He looks like a normal panther.”

“Oh, he may have the body of a panther, but he has the mind of a far superior creature. The mind of Cyber 29, to be exact. I suppose you remember him.”

He says it as a throwaway comment, as though it does not mean the world to me. As though everything around me does not come to a halt. As though I do not feel my resolve crumbling around me, as though my emotions are not boiling over within my heart. As though he has not given me the most important thing in existence.

I fix my eyes on the slumbering form within the cage. I reach out. My hand trembles as it places itself on the paw that is left dangling outside the cage, timidly, softly. The cat does not awaken. He continues to sleep soundly, the rise and fall of his chest the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.

Brother. My brother.

“Thank you,” I find myself saying, to him. “Thank you, Von Reichter. Thank you for this.”

“Please,” he says, and he’s smiling again. “Call me ‘Father.’”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wasn't that fun? Yes. Hope you liked it, I'd love it if you let me know what you think!
> 
> Next chapter perhaps some more explanation of Cybersix's role as Von Reichter's daughter!
> 
> I know this story seems like I'm jumping all over the place and I don't have a set plan for how I'm gonna write it, and that's exactly how it is, I hope that's okay with you and you're along for the ride! :)


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